FIRST Robotics Competitors Help Celebrate National Engineering Month

Waterloo –through collaboration with the University of Waterloo and FIRST Robotics, the Grand River Chapter PEO headed out to the FIRST Robotics Regionals on March 20, 2015 to talk to the many high school competitors about the profession of engineering while at the same time, celebrate National Engineering Month (NEM).

Most students were unaware that it was NEM so it was it was an opportune time to get the message out about what the profession is, how it protects the public, the need for innovation and that people from diverse set of backgrounds form the profession.

With around 400 attending the FIRST Robotics social, two PEO volunteers spent their evening talking about what engineers do and the future path to become one. Some were in grade 12 and had already submitted their applications to engineering programs – they were eagerly awaiting acceptance results. But many of the younger students who had yet to make up their minds on their future careers had many questions. With the number of interested students, the two volunteers were quickly overwhelmed.

It was impressive seeing the high school students come in their groups which were around 20 to 40 strong. All had excellent team sprit, dressed in team uniforms and some even going that extra step as you can see with the haircuts.